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Post by Captain McDerp on Aug 29, 2015 10:25:14 GMT
Sorry for being late on answering the meta questions and getting things organised, but here I am.
Posted by moopli:
Meta:
Some questions:
Should we use some sort of timeline format to keep the space race organized? How do we handle disagreements on, say, whether an advancement is unrealistic? (not that there's anything that I think is unrealistic yet, though the vacuum-chamber-oven tech is seriously pushing it imo) How will we decide on important in-universe science/lore questions like "is there a physically-feasible form of FTL?"? How long will the species-introduction phase be? When can we move from basic stage-setting and introduction to the great race itself?
Yeah, we need some sort of timeline to keep things organised and fair. The species shouldn't get too far ahead of eachother. The key element in this is that this isn't a race or competition, more like a dynamic story. And any significant leaps in (unrealistic) technology should be discussed. It should be feasible and/or fair for the other races.
Example: You shouldn't go "HUE MY SPECIES HAS SECRETLY DEVELOPED WARP DRIVES AND IS ABOUT TO CARPET BOMB YOUR PLANET WITH NUKES."
And to keep it simple there should only be a few ways of getting FTL tech. Maybe we could create some kind of FTL tech tree. One could be an alcubierre drive for example, moopli is good at coming up with cool, realistic ideas so maybe he knows a few cool ways to go FTL. (Everybody can make suggestions though) Any other big questions that come up later should be discussed by everyone to see what people want from this RP.
And the introduction phase is fine as long as you keep it within one or two posts. But no entire novels please.
Sorry if this post is a bit messy but I have to leave in a moment.
EDIT:
And about the exon solar powered steam stuff; Sending a big steampunk craft which generates steam with solar energy as propulsion is probably as unfeasible as you can get. So just stick to conventional chemical propulsion for your early space program. It might sound dull, but a little bit of realism is preferred.
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Post by Captain McDerp on Aug 29, 2015 18:20:18 GMT
I just wrote a huge post about the va'ngur I sending the first probe into orbit. It took pictures of Shilia and sent back data of the space around it. The uah' invented microchips for their probes. The second probe crashed due to the solid rocket boosters on the lifter exploding.
Im sorry but chrome crashed and I cannot be bothered to re-write it. I spent 20 minutes writing it. So the above is a summary of events.
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Post by Moopli on Aug 29, 2015 22:28:50 GMT
Woohoo, thanks for the answers!
We're lucky enough to have (as my rough estimate) at least 50 years before any species in this game will be trying to go FTL -- in the best of circumstances, where all available resources on a planet are concentrated on the task of improving space technology (meaning we'd probably dislike how hard of a wanking they're getting). So, we'll probably have a few pages of updates (upwards of 5, 10 maybe) before people are moving FTL, traveling across interstellar space, and we need to
My posts here have certainly been on the heavy side, so I'm putting together an abridged timeline of what the East Pacific Tree Octopus has done so far. Before that, though, I wanted to pull out a few ideas I've seen for potential FTL:
- The Alcubierre Drive: allows FTL travel without a pre-constructed structure, mostly without limits, apart from the need to avoid obstacles I believe (massive shear forces at the leading and trailing edges of the bubble iirc). Requires some exotic forms of matter. - Heim Theory (this name might be wrong): an attempt at creating a grand unified model of physics, one strange feature of the model is that it's possible to use some funky tech to create a spacetime-warping bubble (or is it a temporary tube? I am not totally sure) that can take you between two points of sufficient spacetime flatness. I like it a lot, because the math provides enough justification for some interesting story implications: You can launch from either far away from your star, or from certain Lagrange points, and can return to normal space at locations far enough from strong gravitational wells, but it is very very very hard (mathematically almost impossible) to land at lagrange points, meaning there's a certain asymmetry which favors the defenders of solar systems over an attacking force. Can be created without needing any exotic form of matter. - Wormholes: Two spheres in faraway parts of space, entering the surface of one causes you to effectively exit the surface of the other, as they are connected just as much as adjacent parts of regular space are. Difficult to create and maintain, very effective, but keeping them from breaching causality can be a doozy. Require some exotic forms of matter to stabilize. - Krasnikov Tube: A specific type of wormhole, in the form of tube between two points in space -- fly from one end, along it to the exit, at near light-speed, and you will reach the end faster than you would expect. Effectively a spacetime megastructure constructed by warping the wake of a superluminal object -- so the ends are displaced in both space and time (by a classical definition of time -- given that general relativity means there is no universal reference time, saying 'a wormhole is displaced in time' is effectively meaningless). To my limited reading they seem to have even more causality problems than other types of wormhole, but there are some theoretical mechanisms proposed which would prevent breaking causality. Shouldn't require any exotic form of matter, just some crazy antics with gravity and high-energy particles, and a superluminal object whose wake can be turned into a tube.
There's probably more stuff, but I don't have the time right now to look more stuff up. I like the synergy between Heim-theoretical drives and the Krasnikov tube -- no exotic matter necessary, just some superconducting coils and a bunch of other crazy tech, and you can send off ships that can be easily resupplied. We'd have to decide what limits we want to put on these technologies, if we want to even the field between competing FTL methods, for example, Alcubierre drives might be able to go faster than Heim drives, etc.
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Post by mitobox on Sept 5, 2015 2:55:12 GMT
After days of staring into the sky, the observatory room is mostly deserted. It's just Rladhu staring into the scope, and a lowly janitor sweeping the floor absentmindedly. It's kind of odd seeing a creature with the posture of a crab using a tool made for upright bipedal creatures, but it works. The rest of the scientists are at work on FurBelgiuma-3.
Rladhu takes a sip of a coffee-like drink made from ground Greatwood seeds. The brew helps keep him awake. The strong, bitter scent wafts over to the janitor, who is really wishing he had some himself. Suddenly, Rladhu makes a sharp intake of breath and runs over to a computer. The startled janitor looks over, wondering what he saw.
Rladhu turns on the monitor and has the computer replay the last few minutes of recorded starwatching. It doesn't look like much, just a grayscale field of stars, moving slowly. The janitor scuttles closer out of curiosity. Right when the janitor gets there, he notices, bright as day, one of the stars suddenly disappear for a moment, then come back. Rladhu cheers, looking at the janitor.
"That blink we saw? That was a distant planet passing in front of its parent star. Harara won't be able to deny this one!"
The sudden blink is allowed to become public knowledge. Interest in the observatory skyrockets; Rladhu and even the janitor are interviewed on what happened.
A letter is sent to Harara regarding the discovery. He is more than a little annoyed. If he keeps up the accusations, he'll look bullheaded, and if he exposes the covered-up transmission, then he himself would be exposed as a blackmailer and liar. He lets it all pass. After all, Gaunga has been an effective means of communication, and if the transmission wasn't Shaskush's doing, then there was no way his speaking with his proxies could be interrupted or tapped.
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Skyguy98
Spacefaring
Lord of the Skies (pic found by atrox)
Posts: 1,637
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Post by Skyguy98 on Sept 7, 2015 0:34:46 GMT
As the sun rises on the first day of the 6th year after the 3rd unification war, the first tangible progress of the Imperial Space Program is seen, as the Kingdom of Lavi launches the first satellite to make a round trip around the planet. While the Kingdom celebrates, their rivals begin to try picking up speed on their programs, with the people of the United Districts begin theorizing about the use of the Nuclear Rockets used to end the 3rd unification war and possibly use of nuclear energy in space, while the Peoples State begin more ambitious plans. The Imperial Palace publicly congratulates the Kingdom, but orders a release of known theories from all nations, and orders registration to the Imperial Space Agency to prevent another surprise launch. This order is contested in the Senate but is not blocked, as the weaker nations take advantige of this law to give them an easier time getting on track.
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Post by Captain McDerp on Sept 19, 2015 10:07:55 GMT
And then a big empire from a another galaxy came and whiped out all races.
But seriously, if this thread will remain unused for the next week or so I will declare this RP dead. There is too little activity.
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Post by Moopli on Sept 20, 2015 18:36:42 GMT
Aww man. I think what we need to do is agree to fast-forward enough that we can all collaborate and interact with each other instead of upteching alone while sending a few messages back and forth.
Unless we can come up with a good way to do that, though, then yeah this is probably dead. Pity, too.
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Post by Captain McDerp on Oct 3, 2015 11:19:59 GMT
Aight.
Thread is dead. Don't bother posting on here if you're new to the forums. Nobody will respond.
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Post by Atrox on Oct 4, 2015 20:00:26 GMT
Post because I'm a rebel.
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